Attack of the Albino Brain Chiggers**

**Joke shamelessly stolen from Third Rock From the Sun.

Oh, my goodness.

That last snowfall warning I told you about dumped up to 70 cm on my city, although it packed down to about a foot in most places, and we got a thaw Monday afternoon that made the roads passable. However, now it's blanketing down again.

I'll reiterate that I live in the one magical little corner of Canada that doesn't get snow. Supposedly.

Yesterday, I saw a car with a mohawk (the driver tried to swipe the roof clear, but couldn't reach the middle, so: snow mohawk), and today I can't see anything; the buildings are grey shadows with white static falling in front of them and an erased world behind them.

Nothing is going to move today; not buses, not cars, not planes, and probably not even pedestrians. I feel so sorry for the people who had planned to travel for the holidays. If you're one of those, please have an internet hug and a virtual rum toddy from me.

~~~~~~~

What it looks like right now:


A more typical winter day:


The Albino Brain Chiggers have eaten the cars:

*sings* It's beginning to look a lot like hypothermia...

El Husbando's computer wallpaper shows a composite satellite image of the Earth with the current weather superimposed over it. A few days ago, clouds obscured most of North America. Basically, the whole continent had a snowstorm.

I live in the one small corner of Canada that consistently doesn't get snow, but we've had it for a week now, and it shows no signs of going away. The temperature is currently about -10 C (14 F).

I happen to be a very efficient heat exchanger when it comes to my environment, i.e. I'm a cold wimp. While most of Canada considers -10 C a laughably balmy winter temperature, it's freakin' freezing to me. At least I grew up on the prairies, and even spent four years of my childhood in Yellowknife, so I know I'm just a wimp.

I'm in good company, in that regard. In the snow, my city entertains. We just don't have the tools to deal with this invasion of angel dandruff. We haven't ice scrapers for windshields, snow shovels for sidewalks, winter tires, proper clothing, or nearly enough snowplows in the city.

Traffic becomes a ballet of pirouetting cars. The tires sing every morning, sounding like herds of drunken sleeping bags unzipping themselves. Every hill peers down its nose at little clusters of vehicles, watching as the drivers whir bravely toward its summit, only to slalom down backward again. One bus driver had to ask his passengers to cluster over the rear axle so he could finish his route.

In the snow, My usually-trendy city loses its fashion mind. High-heeled leather boots are paired with bobble hats and mittens. Long formal coats strain and bulge over the lumps created by four layers of sweaters. People hustle down the street, their hands knotted over their nose or slapping their ears flat to their skull.

Yup. It's a winter wonderland.

The thing that's most amusing is while the locals struggle with the snow, they also find it genuinely exciting. Snow is rare, and pretty, and they associate it with skiing, which is fun. I'm an old grump about the white stuff, but I'm certain they enjoy these little blasts of "real" winter.

My family teases me about my long-lost tolerance for cold, of course. My parents live on the prairies, where -40 C (-40 F) might not be nice, but they can deal with it. My brother is in Iceland, which tends to not get much below 0 C (32 F) but has a wind chill that can freeze-dry your eyeballs. My sister lives in Georgia, and she misses the snow.

Especially around this time of year. It'll be a rare white Christmas for me, and only a few years ago, that was the standard for her.

On El Husbando's weather map right now? More clouds. Apparently we've another big dump of snow on the way, and the city is still crippled from the last one. I'm going to dash out (swaddled like baby Jesus; very festive, n'est pas?) and stock up on food and chocolate, because I intend to hibernate this cold snap out.

El Husbando, loony snow-loving local boy that he is, keeps trying to convince me we need to go for a walk.

(PS - Sarflin, I'm wearing that Icelandic wool sweater/coat you bought right now. It's awesome!)

Crack the WIP | Crack the whip | How do I make it stop? | I'm a geer!

Drive-by blog entry!

Chapter 0001: Writing news
I am over 20,000 words into my current WIP. Hurray for 6 AM!

Chapter 0010: Holiday news
HohohohMyGoodnessWhyHaven'tIStartedMyShoppingYet?

Chapter 0011: Blog news
In desperation, I've gone back to my R0bert Pattins0n entries and removed both his photo and the "o"s in his name (they're zeroes now; the font camouflages this), because until I stop getting traffic for the hunka-hunka, my stat counter is useless.

Darn it, I wanna know about the 10 people here to listen to me yammer! Not the 2000 giving Mr. Drool-Worthy his due. Never again shall I underestimate the preternatural power of that man's unholy hair. *shudder*

Chapter 0100: Work news
They want me to teach an engineering lab next semester. Woe and gnash-gnash-gnashing of toothies. My students are gonna be so much smarter than me it'll be painful.

Terror in the Land of Freaky Follicles

My friend Chris prompted me, via his recent blog post regarding the phenomenon of "viral" success on the internet, to go check my website statistics tonight. I hardly ever do this, and it was good that Chris convinced me to, because getting the pants scared off you is great for the circulation.

I average about 10 hits a day, generally. Before I went on blog hiatus a few months back, I got more, but not much more.

Now...remember that silly post about R0bert Pattins0n's hair? *points downward*

That got 853 hits today.

This is in comparison to 63 hits yesterday, and given the post is internet-old (i.e. it was published last Wednesday), you know something freaky just happened.

It turns out a huge majority of the visitors got here via a Google image search for R0bert Pattins0n, so the abrupt success of OxyJen is likely due to my post getting picked up by a web crawler.

Thank my frickin' stars. Who wants to be famous for making fun of someone's hair?

R0bert Pattins0n's Sentient, Self-Washing Hair

I learned something yesterday. It was a subject I'd never even heard of before.

Interviewer: What is all this talk about you not washing your hair for months on end?

R0bert Pattins0n: People are scared of my hair. But it starts washing itself after about three weeks.

R0bert Pattins0n, by the way, is the male star of the new Twilight movie. For teens, he is the hunka-hunka-du-jour. He also has really crazy-looking hair, and it often doesn't look particulary clean.

But "washing itself"? What the heck?

It turns out this isn't merely the stoned-out ramblings of a starlet-boy. "Self-washing" is a state of hair.

Let me back up, because if I give you the short version of this, you'll just be disgusted and disbelieving. You need to hear everything.

Consider a cat, or a bunny, or a foofy Pomeranian dog. You don't wash your pet every day, right? They only get a bath every few months, and yet a cat's hair (or a bunny's, or a doggie's) always feels soft, clean and glossy and/or fluffy. Why is that? Why don't cats get greasy-hair days?

The answer is that a cat's oil glands, skin and hair have all evolved to keep the cat's fur clean and healthy with nothing more than water-based baths. In the wild, that's all a cat gets. The jungle just ain't got soap.

The thing that is really bizarre--and frankly hard-to-believe for us modern folks--is that human hair is the same way. Because we shampoo regularly, we strip off our natural oils and upset the body's balance. As a result, if we stop shampooing, our hair starts to look greasy and disgusting in a matter of days due to over-production of oil.

Here's where the "self-washing" thing comes in.

Apparently, if you stop using shampoo, but rinse your hair in warm water regularly (for example, every time you shower), then after about six weeks of suffering beneath your greasy, disgusting, smelly mop of hair, your system finally sorts itself out. Your natural balance of oils reasserts itself, and your hair starts looking clean and fluffy again. You've entered the "self-washing" phase.

Of course, your hair doesn't really wash itself. I suspect what happens is the hair shaft becomes so well-moisturized that it swells shut and becomes impervious to dirt. And since most dirt and all sweat-residue is water-soluable, a quick rinse is all that's required to swoosh the yucky-yuck off your impervious hair.

People who do this--and obviously you're only going to hear from those who think "self-washing" is groovy--report their hair is healthier, nicer-looking, and more manageable than it was when they washed it in shampoo, and that no one ever notices the difference, and that scalp problems and dandruff often disappear, and that they're happy to not be spending money on shampoo they don't need or sluicing unnecessary detergents into the environment.

Huh.

On one hand, this "self-washing" thing is fascinating to me because I'd never heard even a whisper about it before.

But on the other, behold R0bert Pattins0n's hair:

Ew. Is that hair gel, or...?

(Picture removed because its presence was doing crazy things to my hit rate, liek woah OMG.)

~~~~~~~

Has anyone here ever had "self-washing" hair, either intentionally or accidentally? If so, what did you think? Does this system actually work? Does it sorta work? Is the phenomenon of "self-washing" hair a sham, or is shampoo the real sham?

As an experiment, I tried just rinsing my hair instead of washing it last night, and then I brushed it heavily once it was dry (which you're supposed to do, to distribute the oils.)

My hair should look disgusting right now, but to be honest, it just doesn't. It's not crazy-flyaway like normal, which is nice, and although it has less luster, it doesn't look dirty at all. I'm truly surprised. El Husbando hasn't noticed anything either, which is great, because when I mentioned "self-washing" to him yesterday, he thought it sounded utterly revolting.

But yeah. I'm probably not going to continue this experiment beyond today.

**warily eyes R0bert Pattins0n's hair**

Edit 10/01/2009: Okay, I lied. I did go through with it. Read this post if you'd like to know what I thought of "self-washing" hair, as well as my best-discovered way of getting through the icky six-week transition stage.

Weirdness

I'm steaming my eyeballs tonight.

It's okay; they're still in my head. My eyes have felt very dry lately, even when they're not. Eyedrops don't help, but sticking a mug of hot water under my nose and blowing to force the steam into my peepers is quite soothing. The guys at work must think I have a bladder of titanium, given how much of today I spent looking like I was just in the middle of a sip.

Writing in the early morning is still proving to be an effective habit, although I'm a bit worried it's to blame for the sore eyeballs (Ah hah! You can be allergic to mornings!)

Hmm. I feel like splattering some personal stuff here tonight. I suspect that's why I sat down to blog.

This has been a bit of weird day, and not in a good way, and I'm going to use that to jump off on a weird tangent.

I gave a lab exam this morning, and one of my students came in and gave me...I'll just call it a thoroughly acceptable reason for not being able to write the test. I don't want to give out any of her details, but it involved two deaths in her family since I saw her last. The poor kid looked like she was hanging on by a thread. Then tonight, I found out about a death in my extended family, one that has some worrisome implications for other family members.

This morning I had a mild feeling of dread when I said goodbye to my husband. I'm a bit of an anxious person, so I didn't pay much attention to this, but here's where I veer off on my tangent.

My family's supposed to have a bit of the "sight", as in second sight, or psychic ability. I've always been of the opinion that I didn't get any of it.

Now, before I really get rolling here, let me back up one step. As mentioned, I tend to be anxious, and I have a frolicsome imagination also, so as a child, I was acutely terrified of the world. My brain was quite willing to picture ghouls and aliens and nuclear bombs coming to get me.

When I got older, I discovered the The Skeptical Enquirer, and it really was a liberating experience, because it gave the more rational parts of my brain ammunition to use against my imagination. Now I could now say, "Okay, that's bullshit" to a lot things I'd not been sure of before. It helped me feel a lot braver.

And for the most part, I still think the majority of evidence in favour of the paranormal is bullshit. Usually, these things are either self-delusion or con artistry. I do still count myself as a skeptic. If you tell me you believe in tarot cards or astrology, I will mock you.

So it's a bit odd--and possibly pathetic--that now I'm older still, and I've made a truce with the fact that, y'know, maybe I did get a bit of the family ability? I can rationalize that I'm really deluding myself, but if I listen to this inner detector that is too random to properly test, the statistics don't work out in favour of it being self-delusion.

El Husbando and I tend to not answer our phone during the day because it's usually a telemarketer. However, every now and then, I know it's someone we should talk to and I jump at the phone. I'm not always right, but I usually am. I have been the last four times.

When we were in London recently, my brother called to say his plane was delayed and he didn't know when he'd be joining us at the hotel. El Husbando and I settled down to watch some TV. A time later, I got the strong feeling that I should go down to the lobby and check for my brother. Rationally, I kept thinking, "No, there's no reason why he should be here yet, and even if he is, you'd probably miss him in the elevators." At the same time, I could picture myself finding him in the line-up for the check-in counter.

As I said, I've kind of made peace these hunches. I quietly slipped out and trotted downstairs. Waiting in the line-up for the check-in counter was exactly where I found him.

Walking to the room, my brother asked how I'd known he was in. Embarrassed, I shrugged and said the ol' family psychic ability had given me a tingle. He just nodded and said, "Yeah. I get those too."

My experiences are pretty mild stuff. Here's some of the freakier family stories:

- My dad once looked up from his reading and answered a question my mom hadn't asked yet.

- My grandfather once woke out of a sound sleep, then woke up my grandmother, and told her one of their neighbours had died. It turned out the fellow had, that night.

- That same grandmother dreamed of an almost-car-accident my mom had on the same night the almost-accident happened. The dream upset my grandmother enough she had to call my mom to make sure she was alright.

- My brother once fell asleep in an exam, and woke up when the bell rang. His test was complete. His teacher said he saw my brother put his head down for a minute, but then my brother sat up again and continued writing the exam. The questions my brother remembers answering, he got wrong. All the ones he answered while asleep, he got right.

Like I said, whatever I've got, it's comparatively pretty mild. I can't guide it (it didn't help me in Vegas last time I went), and it's not always correct. It's also often the sort of thing that could just be my subconscious picking up on subtle clues I didn't twig to.

Basically, it's just not very testable, which annoys the scientist in me, but it's bad science to dismiss something as imaginary just because you can't figure out a test for it. Of course, the real reason I'm accepting the hunches at face value these days is I feel like I'm cutting off something important inside me when I try to believe they're not real. Plus, there's little harm in this, because I don't even think about it until I get the "tingle". Hunches do not rule my life, and I do not walk in fear of the uncanny.

Now, how to sum up a post like that? I should have gotten this up in time for Hallowe'en! Goblin LOLs at herself.

Well...how about like this: When I signed on with my agent, she expected a quick sale, and I hoped for one too.

But I had a feeling the book wouldn't sell anytime soon.

Guess what? :-/

~geeking~

OhMyGoshThisIsAwesome.

1000 ft. under the desert in Mexico, they've discovered a cave filled with enormous crystals.

I mean really enormous. Tree-sized. The longest is 37.5 ft. Wouldn't you love to run around this place?





Unfortunately, the cave stays at 112 °F (50 °C) and has 100% humidity. I don't think they're going to turn this place into Carlsbad Caverns anytime soon.

But wow. This one of those cases where reality did something that you could not put in a book and make people believe was real.

The following YouTube video shows still shots, but they're pretty amazing, regardless.

Wo ist der Trip Report, bitte?

Oh, goodness. A trip report? Did I really promise a trip report? Just making up the photo album was exhausting. Captions for 800 photos; what on Earth was I thinking.

I think, right now, that I'll actually talk about writing for once.

I've decided. I have committed. Yes: I am willing to suffer for my art.

I--a lifelong night-owl--have been getting up at six a.m. every morning to write before going to work.

This is both fun, and not fun, as you can imagine. On one leg o' the chicken, I finally seem to be getting past the dribbles-and-drabs stage of my new project and the words are beginning to flow. But on the other scratcher-de-la-poulet, we're talking six-freakin-a.m. Every day. Including Sunday morning--and you know that six a.m. on Sunday morning is only supposed to be witnessed by those whose Saturday night has been wonderfully epic and untainted by sleep.

Basically, I feel the same way about early mornings that Travis Erwin feels about vegetables.

~~~~~~~

In other quasi-writing news, I've fallen off the wagon. The internet and I are kanoodling again. This did, however, give me the chance to enjoy Nathan Bransford's recent guest-bloggers' articles. The ones by Michelle Moran (Part 1, Part 2) regarding how to market your book are particularly great, and I do recommend them to all writers.

~~~~~~~

This weekend was the Surrey International Writers' Conference. It's a wonderful conference that focuses on the craft of writing, but I have one expensive trip and two expensive dental surgeries under my belt this fall, so I bailed on attending.

Hmm... Perhaps the very talented and warm-hearted writer Brenda Carre would like to do a guest blog here on OxyJen and tell us what she thought of SiWC 2008? *slides Brenda a hopeful look*

~~~~~~~

This last bit of news is very sad, but important: If you've got a moment, please pop by Sandra Cormier (a.k.a. Chumplet)'s blog and wish her strength. Brandon Crisp, the missing Ontario teenager, is her nephew. If you live in the Barrie region of Ontario, Canada, please consider volunteering to be part of a search party, and if you live in Ontario at all, certainly have a look at Brandon's picture so you'll know him if you see him. The police would appreciate any information you might have that would help them locate him.

Best wishes, Sandra, to you and your family. My heart hurts for you, and I hope they find Brandon soon.

Update: They found Brandon's body on Nov. 5th. He apparently died of injuries sustained falling out of a tree, which he may have climbed in order to stay warm or protect himself from wildlife.

Fifteen years old. You can't not feel terribly sad about this. I wish Sandra and her family all the warmth and strength they need to deal with their awful loss.

Back from Vaca! (Part 2)

El Husbando and I just got back from a spectacular almost-3-week trip to Europe, and since I didn't take good enough notes to write a proper trip report this time, I'm going to do a quasi-trip report here for the benefit of friends and family.

Here, on the blog, where you can ignore it without guilt. You see, I firmly believe in giving people the opportunity to show a polite and kind-hearted interest in my life without actually forcing them to look at every stinkin' one of our 867 travel photos or read my blathering 20,000+ word trip report.

A mini-report will be up here in--ooh--the next week or so? I need to look through our 867 (no, I wasn't kidding about that number) photos to remind myself what we did. Heathrow airport didn't lose our luggage, but I'm going to blame them for the fact that I apparently didn't bring my brain home with me.

Nevertheless, it is good to be home. We had a great time, and could have easily gone another week without feeling like it was too much, but it is pleasant knowing where my next pair of clean underwear is coming from.

Super-mini-report:

We walked everywhere (except Iceland, where it was cold.) El Husbando and I estimate we hoofed over 80 km during the trip. It proved a great way to see the various big cities.

Vienna was the prettiest city we went to. I took a ridiculous number of photos of curlicue buildings there, and regretted it later in the trip when we began to run out of memory space for the camera. While in Vienna, we spoke really horrible German at the locals, saw a Mozart concert, found great figs, and watched a pigeon cross the street using the cross-walk. I swear, European pigeons don't fly; they are strictly pedestrians. I am not making this up: the pigeon waited on the corner until the light turned green, and once the people started walking, it walked alongside us to the other side.

Rome had the most historically interesting stuff and was probably our favourite destination (although we had a hard time picking a highlight from the trip.) El Husbando was most excited about going to Rome, since both his parents came from there, and he dragged me out the night we arrived to go walking. We walked to the Vatican, we walked to the Colliseum, we walked everywhere, or so it felt. I'm glad we did it, but at the time, I thought El Husbando had morphed into El Loco. We saw all that territory again, and in more detail, on our tour the next day, but it was great seeing it at night without any crowds.

Italian food proved to be as good as everyone says (especially the gelato), although we were by this point already trying to save money by going to grocery stores and buying bread/rice cakes, cheese and olive paste to eat back at the hotel. Tasty, but we got a lot of pimples from our distinctly-lacking-in-greens diet.

Paris is frilly. The decorations on the historical buildings are more elaborate than we saw in other cities, and they gild a lot of things there. The Eiffel Tower was a short walk from our hotel and looks very pretty lit up with blue lights and white sparkles at night--which it currently is because France is the head of the EU right now, and the EU's flag is blue with gold stars. We went up the tower twice, once during the day and once at night. We also spent sixteen billion years in the Louvre and only saw half of it. What a massive building!

French wine is as good, and cheap, as everyone says. El Husbando bought a bottle that cost the equivalent of $10 Canadian, and it was excellent. He said that in Canada, something that good would cost at least $40. He got another bottle at the duty-free store on our way to the Chunnel, and he's not usually one to polish off two bottles in the space of four days!

London was the city I was most excited to see, and it also had the added bonus that we were meeting my brother (Sarflin), who lives in Iceland now, there. London proved to be the most sprawling city we visited, so walking everywhere didn't prove very practical, but we did a lot of it anyway. Overall impressions? Regent's Park is much prettier than Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace is a teeny-tiny thing compared to some of the other palaces we saw (both in London and in other cities), and Big Ben and the houses of Parliment are waaaay awesomer than they look on TV.

My brother picked up a wicked cold while in London, so I want to thank him again for taking us around in Iceland despite being feverish and making occasional attempts to catapult his lungs at the horizon. Iceland is an amazing place! The scenery is exotic, a cross between desert-like and stark tundra. We did the Golden Circle tour, where we saw Geysir (the word "geyser" came from this place), Goss Fells (a HEE-UGE waterfall), the rift where the North American tectonic plate is separating from the European plate, and a geothermal plant where they produce very cheap electricity and hot water for Reykjavik. We also took a walk along the seawall with Sarflin before sending him home to try to steam-clean his sinuses in the shower.

That night, Reykjavik got the first snowfall of the season, so driving to the airport the next day allowed us to see Iceland in white. This was completely different, but just as beautiful and exotic. The landscape is all jumbled lava rocks and rifts, with mountains in the background, and the snow allows you to see where all the cracks and bumps lie. El Husbando said that, with snow, the scenery looked the way he had always pictured Iceland looking.

So now I am staring at a pile of dirty laundry twice the size of our suitcase and wondering how that's even possible. It was a long trip, and a mighty ding in the wallet, but you know what? 'Twas totally worth it!

Back from Vaca! (Part 1)

Any writer buddies still loitering about here have probably noted I've not been around the blogosphere. This was partly because work got insane, partly because I went on a splendiferous three-week trip, and mostly due to me deciding the internet was eating my life.

So I quit. Cold turkey.

Um, for a given value of "quit". I kept up on email, of course.

Because the internet's attention span is about three seconds, I suspect I've lost all my regular readers by now, so this blog is now going to be mostly for myself (although I will still talk about writing a lot), for friends, and for family.

Speaking of friends, El Husbando and I are blessed to have two who are a pair of the most effortlessly interesting and intelligent people we've ever met. The more energetic half of this couple has leapt into the blogosphere with two blogs, one of which is meant to be a discussion of ideas. Please hop by Chris's ThoughtFood blog and join in. I promise, he's not just a frighteningly energetic thinker, he's also a joy to know.

A Madrigal of Clarity

I was summoned for jury duty recently, but it conflicted with travel plans. I just got the following letter from the Sheriff's office:

Dear [you],
Re: Jury Duty

You have requested to be excused from jury duty.

You are excused.

Therefore you do not have to appear on [redacted date] for jury selection.

Yours truly,
[et cetera]

I am kinda in love with this letter. Talk about ascribing to the principle of "omit needless words"! This is clear and complete, and a third grader could understand it.

It reminds me of something an American friend, who immigrated to Canada, but who had also worked with new immigrants in the States, once noted: You can tell a lot about the mindset you're up against by the language that gets used on you.

If you want to immigrate to Canada, the forms you need to fill out are written in fifth-grade comprehension level English (or French.)

If you want to immigrate to the United States, the forms you need to fill out are written in legalese.

Guess which country is more open to the idea of you moving in.

I read Tara Road by Maeve Binchy recently, and I was struck by how effectively the author communicated her protagonist's turmoil after that character's husband admits he has made a younger woman pregnant and is leaving his wife. Ms. Binchy did it solely by changing the protagonist's voice; a previously bubbly and bumbling personality was abruptly delivering lean, razor-edged dialogue. She didn't sound anything like how she had in the rest of the book, and it worked beautifully. You knew this woman was both shattered by and hostile to the future her husband was forcing upon her.

In your writing, do you ever alter the way a character speaks to betray their mindset? Even beyond changing the rhythm of how they speak in order to show emotion, do you change their voice?

Congratulations! | Dude, you okay? | Twilight of the Fans' Expectations

I haven't been blogging much lately, so cheers to anyone who's still around. Happily, Stuart Neville, a.k.a. Conduit, has given me an excellent reason to break radio silence--he just got a publishing contract! Congratulations, Stuart! I'm so happy for you and I can't wait to read The Ghosts of Belfast.

~~~

Dwight, you gave me awesome advice once and I'd like to repeat it back to you, in hope it will help: Get those keys a-bobblin', soldier.

Don't stop doing what you love. Just stop needing what you can't get (yet.) You're talented, and you're definitely missed, buddy.

~~~

I'm fascinated by the craze over the final book in the Twilight teen vampire series. Breaking Dawn is suffering some backlash from fans of the series, just as the final book in the Harry Potter series did.

The Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows backlash was due to very invested fans who were disappointed the author didn't end the series the way they envisioned. Perhaps a favourite character was killed, or a much wished-for romantic pairing never happened. Whatever the case, these fans were irate. Many started writing fanfiction to "fix" the author's mistakes.

"Positioning" is a marketing term. It means giving your potential audience an idea of what to expect before they put their money down. If you title a book Desert Passions and show a scantily-clad couple groping each other atop a camel on its cover, then your potential customers will expect a steamy romance set in the desert.

If that story turns out to be a murder mystery instead, then even if it's a really great book, the reader will be angry. They didn't get what they thought they were paying for.

I think the backlash for both Breaking Dawn and Deathly Hallows is due to the fans having positioned themselves. The marketing departments were no match for fandom. In the space between publication dates, the fans thought so much about the series' storylines and characters, and formed such detailed expectations of what was coming in the next book, that the author's vision proved a disappointment. The fans didn't get what they thought they were paying for, and they frothed and raved mightily; woe and alack.

This is an amazing phenomenon. On one fang, it's a massive compliment to the author so many people loved her series that they created an autonomous and complex community for themselves. On the other, it's absurd the community would be so self-contained they reject the author's next work because she didn't cater to their whims (using her psychic ability, presumably.)

I haven't read the Twilight books, and while I think there are elements in them that would make me angry for political reasons, they strike me as simply being really enjoyable trash--cheesy, addictive and insane in the best possible way. (Sparkly vampires. Need I say more?)

I could be depressed that people get so excited over fluff, rather than things that matter, but at the same time fandoms really endear me to humanity. We can't agree on the important stuff, but we can unite in our love (or hatred) of sparkly vampires. It's kinda sweet.

From Aboard a Barge Floating Down a Minor Tributary of the River Styx

I am still not dead.

Not that you would know, because I've been a bad blogger again. This has been a busy day following a busy weekend following a busy last week. And now, I'll whine some more. *whimper, snivel*

Okay, I'm done. It's safe to keep reading. In fact, it should be fun because my brain is currently doing the cha-cha in Flakeyville. Did you know the Sleep Deprivation Creek runs through Flakeyville? It's a tributary of the River Styx; you're only half-dead when you cross it.

I had a minor fear realized yesterday (nothing to do with being half-dead, or virtually-dead, a.k.a. dead on the internet, however.) My mom mentioned she'd read my blog.

Eek. Okay, now I feel bad about all the swearing in that one post.

However, as a writer seeking publication, you have to be willing to spatter yourself all over the page and make it public. That's the point; you're dragging things out of your brain and showing everybody. They might not like it, but the onus is on them to walk away if that's the case. I do find it hard to put certain things on paper if I'm intending to try to publish it. I've always been bashful, so I find myself sweating and blushing over writing any sort of erotic scene, because...

Well, because my mom might read it. Or my dad, or my grandmother. I'm more complacent with the idea of my siblings reading my work because I think the three of us already know we're pretty darned quirky. I'm not sure the older generations realize that fully.

Incidentally, when my blog's existence got outed to the family, that was also my writing ambitions properly outed. I had told my parents I'd written a book, but I hadn't said more to anyone because what's the point? Until it's published, there's not much to report that's interesting to anybody but me.

As far as I know, my agent doesn't know I blog either. She's welcome to, because this is public space, but I haven't told her I do this. Again, I'm willing to have her see me being freaky--or flakey in the case of today--but I don't necessarily want to point it out.

Is there anything you avoid putting in your writing because you don't like the idea of people seeing that such things came from your brain? Would you use a pseudonym if you ever got the urge to write, for example, porn or something extremely offensive? Or do you fearlessly slap your name on everything that's yours, and damn the embarrassment that may arise at family reunions? And while we're on the subject, is blogging while over-tired as bad as blogging while drunk? I really can't tell at this point.

The Blogging Equivalent of "Um... So... Like..."

I've pretty much borked getting a blog entry up this weekend, so to hold you over until Tuesday-ish, when I will try to repair this oversight:

Non-Seasonal-Appropriate Cat Bowling!

The reason the blogging didn't get done is I finished the outline for my sequel last night and sent it off to my agent.

It's awesome how hammering out plot details can ignite your enthusiasm to write. I am simmering a stew of ideas for this book now and keep thinking, "Yeah, I could totally write this."

Sequels and Stand-Alones

I've read on various agent blogs that it's best if your first novel is a stand-alone, even if you intend for it to be first in a series. Agents find it easier to sell a book that is self-contained, because the publisher doesn't have to commit to buying the whole series until after they see how that first book sells.

So I was surprised when my agent, Eleanor Wood, asked for an outline to a sequel for DARK HEIR. It turns out that because most of the hot-selling fantasy books right now are series titles, a book with series potential can be easier to sell than a single title.

I hadn't planned to write a sequel for DARK HEIR, at least not yet. I love these characters, but according to my brain, their story has been told. Now it's pashing on new characters. I'm pretty certain, in terms of my long-term writing career, I would be more comfortable writing unrelated novels set in distinct worlds, but I won't get the opportunity to do so unless I get my first sale. Hence, this weekend, I've been plotting out the surprise sequel.

The most surprising thing about it is how quickly it's coming together. I struggled for several months plotting the book I am (was?) working on, but because I already know the characters in DARK HEIR, I know how their personalities need to change and grow next. I also remembered an antagonist who was only assumed to be killed in the first book. Muahahaha! Insta-villain, back from the dead.

Still, it feels like a gear clash to head back to that world, those characters, and that material. I would enjoy writing a sequel to DARK HEIR, because that book's got such a special place in my heart, but I admit I'm dismayed at the thought of putting what I'm working on now aside. Oh, well; a gal's gotta take the long view.

~~~~~~~

Fantasy has a strong market for big books, big stories, and big series, and yet in general fiction, shorter books seems to be the latest trend. If you're a fantasy reader, do you prefer series novels or single titles? Do you like big reads?

If you're not a fantasy reader, how do you react to the same questions? Do you want a fast read, or a big book? Are you happy to come back to a world you've seen before, or would you rather a good book's premise not be rehashed? I'd love to hear your thoughts!

~~~~~~~

P.S. - Don't forget to congratulate Chumplet, a.k.a. Sandra Cormier on Tuesday for the Canada Day e-release of her novel, BAD ICE!

You can win a free copy by participating in her trivia contest on Tuesday, and you can buy an e-copy (for six bucks!!) here at any time.

Assholism (The Writer's Second-Favourite Vice)

(This post is overly-personal and features some very offensive language. My apologies to Julie!)


When I think about the personality traits that serve me best as a writer, empathy tops the list--and I have painful quantities of that one. I was the kid who got hysterical watching "Save The Children" fundraising programs. I'm the woman who really, really doesn't like thinking about where meat comes from. I used to live in an apartment that had mice, and I cried every bloody time my plucky mousetrap bagged another victim.

Being overly-sensitive has its downside, but it's extremely valuable to a writer. Empathy for others is the only thing that allows us to create a spectrum of characters. Because I believe there are few truly evil people in the world--that most villains are really misguided, confused, or simply (and sadly) stupid--I try to make my antagonists human and sympathetic. Because I understand that everyone struggles with weaknesses and fears, I always make my heros flawed. It enriches the story.

But there's another facet of my personality that enriches my stories, and I've been noticing this trait's existence with increasing trepidation the past few years.

Grad school was the hardest thing I've ever done, and I got into a bad head-space because of it. I wound up stressed, depressed and at times extremely angry, and that state lasted for four years. I'm mostly over it now, but the anger didn't exactly go away. It changed form.

Meet "Goblin", my inner bitch. She's the part of me that can give blistering critiques without guilt--and usually without forethought. She's the half of me that enjoys grading students' work when they've done poorly. Goblin relishes participating in an online mocking community, because she gets to act like a sarcastic cunt there.

I'm ashamed of this facet of my personality. I'm a life-long pacifist, and I work as a teacher--a profession where I believe patience is the most enabling and helpful tactic we can adopt. I believe in kindness as a way of life. Nothing makes me angrier than seeing people being mean or thoughtless to one another.

And yet, here's Goblin, who is extremely mean. I know the seed of her existed in me long before grad school, but she's well-defined and fully realized now, and she doesn't want to go away.

The question is, does Goblin have a valid place in my existence? Is she a good demon to have lurking in the back of my writer's brain?

One of the mantras of writing is "conflict on every page". I structure a lot of my dialogue as arguments (of varying civility) between characters. There's always tension, and there's usually snark. Goblin does that well. Sensitive character studies have their place in literature, but so does glorious, fangs-out bitchery. See Jane Austen.

I can make the argument that this darker aspect of my personality is harmless if I give it valid outlets, such as my writing or the mocking community (which attempts to ensure those mocked never find out about it). If I let Goblin have her fun, then I can, the rest of the time, be a positive and supportive person in everything that matters.

The problem is, it doesn't work that way. If I let Goblin out regularly, she starts sneaking out when she's not welcome. For example, I said something sharp to a student the other day, and that is not acceptable. I feel badly about it, and I'm annoyed at myself. This student happens to be a dick, but that's beside the point--how you treat people has nothing to do with who they are; it has to do with who you are. And I don't like who I was that day.

I haven't got a tidy conclusion or lesson to pull out of this post; this is something I'm struggling with. How deeply do you explore negativity? Do you have to occasionally kick your darker stories (and impulses) back into their corner to keep them from infecting your whole life? And if you do, does that weaken your writing? Are you strangling your career to protect your mental well-being? (If you are, it's the right choice, but I'm not really persuaded that writing nasty stories is bad for you.)

For now, I'm letting Goblin out on a short leash, and watching her closely, because I'm learning things. They're not fun lessons, however. I had to apologize to someone recently for a thoughtless comment, and I've lost a blogging buddy over something I still feel justified in saying, even if I regret the consequences. On the mocking community, I've found situations where it stops feeling like happy snarking and starts feeling like spite. There's a line between having a strong opinion and being a jerk, and Goblin--disturbing as she is--is teaching me exactly where that is.

~~~~~~~

What's your advice and opinion regarding this issue? Where do you, personally, draw the line between what you're willing to think about, and what you're not, in order to create a strong story? Have you ever abandoned a work because you didn't like what it was doing to your state of mind?

Or do you find getting those disturbing stories on the page actually lightens your mood, purges you of negative emotions? Is it a positive thing, for you, when you explore the darkest corners of your own mind? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Squealing like a squealy thing | Book Roast!

I'm am completely geeking for this beautiful object:



If you've ever played Dungeons & Dragons, you think you know what you're looking at.

But you don't.

This is a 20-sided die from the second century. It's Roman, it's made of glass, and it's about five centimetres (two inches) across.

I'm squealing like a love-struck piglet over this thing because wow! Who knew the ancient Romans played D&D? We waaaaaants it, my preciousss, we does...

~~~~~~~

And if you haven't already heard from all and sundry, a new blog has debuted to toast and roast the bravest of writers and their fine, fine books. Please click over to the Book Roast, where the abuse fun starts on Monday, and this week's victims guests of honour include:

Bernita Harris (Weirdly) - June 23
Therese Fowler (Souvenir) - June 24
Dennis Cass (Head Case) - June 25
Erica Orloff (The Roofer) - June 26
Doreen Orion (Queen of the Road) - June 27

Seeing Opportunities

Warning: I discuss blood and gore here, in a modestly graphic way. Thou hast been warnéd.

I'm televisionally-challenged. El Husbando and I haven't lived in a house with a TV for about a decade. Thus, when we go to a friend's home to watch movies, it's quite a treat.

We saw Cloverfield last night, and I really enjoyed it, but the movie featured one cliché that annoys me in horror/thriller films. Someone gets a deep gash or bite, and then they proceed to run around. Okay, sure, when the ghoulie-monster is after you, you must run or die--but at some point you must also keel over from blood loss.

When I had gum grafts done, I made the mistake of walking down the street afterward. I got two blocks and then had to start spitting out mouthfuls of blood. From walking. The periodontist had stitched me up tight, but a sedate amble down the sidewalk set me leaking again. There is no way Susie Hero who got impaled through the shoulder should be able to run full tilt for three blocks, even on pure adrenaline. At the very least, she should wind up with her sweatshirt soaked red, her face drained grey, and in such deep shock she can't remember her own name. And then she should spend the rest of the movie deflated in her hidey-hole, incapable of even standing up.

And while I'm on the subject, movie injuries never seem to hurt enough. If I whack my finger in the cupboard door, it leaves me cranky and inclined to whine. In House of Wax, the main character has someone sew her mouth shut and snip the end of her finger off with bolt-cutters. Then she escapes, runs around heroically and makes coherent verbal plans with her brother.

Um...shouldn't she be whimpering in pain every time she has to move her lips? Shouldn't she grimace occasionally, or look down at the stump of her finger and burst into horrified tears? The lack of snivelling strikes me as unrealistic.

There are rich opportunities to be had in refusing to use narrative conveniences in your work. I wrote a story once that featured a character fainting from blood loss while he was trying to get himself to safety. It upped the tension of the story beautifully to have him slipping around, thinking flakey thoughts and occasionally waking up on the floor while the emergency gets worse around him. Keeping the situation realistic didn't just increase the stakes, either; it also gave me another level of conflict. People who suffer sudden blood loss become insanely, intolerably thirsty. When my protagonist was almost to safety, I had him spot a water faucet. Oh, the dilemma.

Writer Brenda Carre passed along to me a bit of advice she got from Donald Maass; when you see something that annoys you in the books you read, put it into your own work and make sure you (unlike everyone else) get it right. Every time you see something that makes you go, "Yeah, right...", that's something you can use--it's a cliché or a plot convenience you can overturn in order to slap your reader with the verisimilitude of the worlds you create. It's something you can potentially shock the reader with when you flip their preconceived notions inside-out.

In other words, when you see a cliché in someone else's work, it's really an opportunity for your own. Use it!

~~~~~~~

What bits of illogic annoy you in books (and films)? Have you ever made a point of skewering that logic in your own work, or found a book that does so brilliantly? If you could convince Hollywood to flip one ubiquitous cliché inside-out, which one would it be? I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Sneaky Bastards

Who’s a sneaky bastard? Us writers. One of the most satisfying things to do to your readers is surprise them while still giving them the story ending that feels right. And surprises are built of sneakiness, because in order for the surprise to seem believable, it needs to be foreshadowed without the audience figuring out what’s coming.

To build a good surprise--the protagonist wiggles her way out of a seemingly impossible dilemma--I like to try to think up something involving non-linear cleverness, something that works but isn’t an obvious solution.

Example: In Gone With the Wind, Scarlett O’Hara pulls down the curtains and gets herself a new dress to impress/fool Rhett with.

To build a nasty surprise, I try to engage in some paranoid fantasies. What’s the nastiest truth that can underlie what appears to be true?

Example: What if Heidi and Spencer only trash-talk Lauren Conrad to market Lauren’s name? After all, the nastier their comment, the more widely it will be reported, and while the public easily ignores advertising campaigns, everyone pays attention to a good cat-fight.

Building surprises is one of the things I find most fun about constructing a plot--what’s the most diabolical shocker I can create that is completely believable when viewed with hindsight? Terry Pratchett said that writing is the most fun anyone can have alone, and when I find myself chortling over my own (hopefully successful) literary sneakiness, I agree with him.

~~~~~~~~

What’s your favourite bit of writer-perpetrated sneakiness? Please feel free to mention either your own or another writer’s. I'd love to hear about the best jaw-dropper you’ve ever encountered, or created, in a story.

Another Reason Why S/He's Just Not That Into You

I'm reading Stephen King's The Stand, and my impressions so far are about what you would expect: it's well-written, the characters are empathetic, and the story pulls you along from page to page.

But it's scary, darn it. The faceless man who stares out of the cornfield in people's dreams? Eep.

I don't think this is even supposed to be one of Mr. King's more terrifying books. I'm just a wimp. But this has got me thinking about why certain people won't read certain genres.

One reason people read is for catharsis. We test-drive emotions we often wouldn't want in real life, like the angst and relief of a good romance, the terror and relief of a good horror, or the tension and relief of a good thriller. However, there are certain emotions some of us don't enjoy, even as a voyeur, even if there is relief waiting at the end of the book.

Here's a non-literary example of this effect: I love rock climbing, but only if I trust my rope setup and belay partner. There's something glorious about being balanced on a wall of warm, silver stone and being able to look back over your shoulder at some incredibly view of mountains, sea and sky. You're all alone up there and that view is all for you.

However, if you pair me with a belay partner whose skills I'm not confident in, my pleasure evaporates. Suddenly I have sweaty fingers and I'm too tense, which makes my muscles tire too quickly. I don't pause to enjoy the view because all I want is to get safely back on the ground. I do not climb for the thrill of it, because I don't enjoy fear.

Hence, I'm not enjoying the scary bits of The Stand. Terror is not an emotion I like to dabble in, even for fun.

It's strange that to enjoy a book, we have to be able to suspend our sense of disbelief and really feel the emotions of the story, yet not feel them so intensely that the story becomes too devastating to tolerate. There's a reason why the publishing industry wouldn't touch terrorism stories for a long time after 9/11; most editors and agents live in New York and work in Manhattan. They were there. The subject wasn't something they could enjoy; they didn't have any emotional distance from it.

I think it's best to aim for emotional truth in your writing, because un-involving stories have no chance on the market, but when your subject matter is both dark and intense, that can limit your audience. It's up to you as an artist to decide where the line is drawn, but there is merit to having the really rough stuff happen off the page. To become a hit, a story must resonate with a large number of people, but at the same time, it cannot stir up feelings that the majority of those people can't handle.

~~~~~~~

What emotional situations do you lap up when you read a book, and does that inform your book choices? Which situations make you hate even a well-written book? I'd love to hear your (darkest, scariest) thoughts!